If 18-29 year olds had split 50-50 between each candidate.

[EconomicLiberal]

The race would have been a tossup and likely as close as 2000 was.

But since 18-29 year voters voted for Barack Obama by a 2:1 margin, Obama won an electoral vote landslide.

Who said the younger voters weren't going to bring it home for Obama?

[Xipe Totec]

1. I did

I stand corrected.

[Historic NY]

2. We must keep this up and keep the young engaged!!!

It has definitely taken the Repuke completely by surprise.

[TheDonkey]

11. Yes, I hope Obama and/or Democrats grab hold of the new generation

drive the rethugs into extinction.

[Cha]

17. The tax credit on College

Tuition helped, I think..and Obama is all about the youth from babies on up.

[unpossibles]

3. If it helps, I think the youth vote has turned out before

But unfortunately, I also think that they were forced to vote provisionally a lot more in the past too. This time, the youth vote got counted fully. Hell, it's still being counted in some areas I believe.

[Arctic Dave]

4. Sometimes those youngins surprise ya.

My sincerest respect to all of them.

[GOPNotForMe]

5. As part of the much-discussed "youth vote" (for now!), this makes me feel good!

I made sure every single one of my damn friends was registered and voting for Obama no matter what. And many of them were lapsed voters or first-time voters :) We did it!

[Tiggeroshii]

6. California would have been much closer

Being that they made up 60% of Californias voters too. We have the power! =)

[bigwillq]

7. And I'm not in that group anymore.

:( I turned 30 in Feb. :( :cry:

[rockymountaindem]

9. Get out of our business you relic

:P

[DrToast]

8. That's the largest spread ever between two candidates in the 18-29 group

If there's one thing that should keep Republicans awake at night, it's that.

And the previous record? 2004.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/11/5/171841/524/28/654938

The youth simply don't identify with the social conservatism of the Republican party.

[BrklynLiberal]

10. Their turnout this election was fantastic...

Youth Turnout Up by 2 Million From 2004

They were the initial cheerleaders of Barack Obama’s candidacy who stuck with him on the long slog to Nov. 4. And on Election Day, young people voted overwhelmingly to send him to the White House while exceeding their 2004 turnout levels by at least 2.2 million, according to researchers who track the voting habits of youth.

Between 21.6 and 23.9 million Americans in the age group from 18 to 29 years cast a ballot, up from about 19.4 million in 2004, numbers-crunchers at the Center for Information and Research of Civic Learning and Engagement, or Circle, announced on Wednesday.

Based on those figures, more young people went to the polls this year than they did in any election since 1972 when the voting age was lowered from 21 to 18, the researchers said. And 66 percent of them supported Mr. Obama, while 31 percent favored Senator John McCain.
<snip>

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/05/youth-turnout-up-by-2-million-from-2004/

[ShadowLiberal]

12. Even better yet, how someone votes their first few elections = likely how they vote forever

Sure once in a rare while people might vote differently then that (like if a really popular moderate runs, or someone really hated who screwed up really bad runs), but often even if people say they're independent they often find themselves voting most of the time for people of the exact same party.

So that means we could soon have a generation of people very heavily loyal to us, having a successful Obama presidency (and not screwing it up like Bush by going for a 50% +1 strategy) would be the item that seals that advantage for several generations.

The polls already show that the young have grown far more liberal, and are heavily turned off the social conservatives when it comes to 'moral values' issues, with 2/3's of them supporting gay marriage (or maybe that was either civil unions or gay marriage). They heavily agree with us on other social issues much more then the general population to.

I read an article today that some republicans are only just now beginning to realize their problem with the young and minorities, saying their giving themselves a permanent math problem, but insisting they don't need to change their policy positions, they only need to return to Reagan conservatism, you know letting hateful preachers like Jerry Falwell try to force their morality onto people and suppress gay rights, something that heavily turns off a lot of young people.

I also read an article recently about the one area democrats failed to make gains in that shows how the republicans could potentially have more problems then they think at capturing the youth vote. The article said that Obama has made like 0 gains among weekly church attending evangelicals (actually I think the poll they cited showed him up 1% more then Kerry was, which was basically the margin of error probably). The reason the article cited is abortion and gay rights issues heavily turning those voters off from the democrats.

Well the fact is lots of young people have gay friends, and are more accepting of gays, so if the republicans try to keep their same gay bashing politics they'll likely face the same problems among young voters, who view that kind of hatred and bigotry as no different then racism.

As a young person (23 years old) who considers themself something between a liberal and libertarian I'll say this. As an economic moderate and person concerned about how the government keeps on adding trillions of dollars to the national debt, you'd think I'd be swingable to the republican party. But nothing disgusts me more then when the GOP preaches their social conservative rhetoric about 'protecting families from gays' and abortion, and getting judges who will suppress both. Even if they ran a candidate claiming to be a social liberal on all those issues I'd be VERY suspicious of them secretly being a social conservative.

[DrToast]

15. The Republicans are really in a bind...

If they reach out to young voters by moderating their social positions, they lose their base. They can't keep both.

The electorate is changing. If they want to be relevant again, they'll have to follow it.

As a young person (23 years old) who considers themself something between a liberal and libertarian I'll say this. As an economic moderate and person concerned about how the government keeps on adding trillions of dollars to the national debt, you'd think I'd be swingable to the republican party.

And the problem here is that nobody believes Republicans are for fiscal responsibility anymore. The most fiscally responsible President of the last 30 years was Bill Clinton.

[knixphan]

13. and i stand vindicated!

GO Youngsters!

[Danger Mouse]

14. Yeah, we like, kick ass like that, or something.

[Jed Dilligan]

16. 18-29's were also against Prop 8 61-39. nt

[Historic NY]

18. I got a feeling it was over the wording...we had a prop in NY that most missed..

dealing with civil service credit points for wounded Iraqi vets....people just don't take the time to read or comprehend what they think they want.